By Jeff Latzke
AP Sports Writer

Oklahoma State University plans to announce a donation Tuesday touted as the highest in NCAA history for an athletic program.



The donation would be the latest in a series of large gifts for the university, which is overhauling and expanding its athletic facilities. The size of the donation and the person making it were not disclosed Monday. A news conference was scheduled for 11 a.m. Tuesday.

T. Boone Pickens, an Oklahoma State alumnus and oil tycoon, donated $20 million to Oklahoma State's athletic department in 2003 as part of a $70 million overall gift to the university.

As thanks for the gift, the largest in school history, the university renamed its football stadium after Pickens. The stadium is undergoing a $102 million renovation to expand seating, add luxury boxes, upgrade facilities for fans and bowl in the west end zone.

Express Personnel Inc. founder and CEO Bob Funk made two significant donations to the university's "Next Level" campaign to pay for the upgrades to Boone Pickens Stadium. At the time of Funk's second donation in September, the campaign had already passed its original $86 million goal.

In May, Pickens and Sherman Smith each donated $1.5 million for new synthetic turf and upgrades to the strength and conditioning facility and football locker room. The turf will eventually be moved to the indoor practice facility and be replaced in the stadium by grass.

The football program isn't the only intended beneficiary of improvements at Oklahoma State, which gave its basketball arena, Gallagher-Iba Arena, a $55 million expansion in 2000.

As part of a proposed master plan, Oklahoma State hopes to create an athletic village with upgraded facilities for track, tennis and soccer and an indoor facility to be used for football, baseball, track and other sports.

Creation of the proposed village requires the university to acquire about 24 blocks of property north of the football and basketball stadiums.

According to a university fact sheet, Oklahoma State spent only $11.7 million on its athletic facilities from 1967 to 1999 and the university's athletic budget ranks 10th in the Big 12 Conference. The cost of the proposed plan, which also includes improvements to academic facilities, is estimated at $500 million.